Telling Wrong From Rights

By William R. Doerner.

Clarence Pendleton is hardly the first chairman of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission to cause controversy, but he is the first to do so by attacking the civil rights programs. In 1984 Pendleton ridiculed comparable worth--the effort to equate pay scales in different jobs--as "the looniest idea since Looney Tunes," and he has denounced U.S. black leaders for marching toward a "political Jonestown" of Government welfare dependence. Pendleton's fighting style has grown more visceral by the issue, so that even some who agree with him think he has lost effectiveness. Commission Member John Bunzel, who usually votes in tandem with the chairman, recently urged him to resign.

Last week Pendleton set off the loudest uproar yet. On the basis of a commission staff report, he proposed that the Federal Government suspend programs aiding businesses owned by women and minorities. Known as set-asides, the programs require federal agencies to earmark part of their spending for companies qualifying for the special treatment. Set-aside contracts now exceed $8.5 billion annually. Like affirmative action programs, they are an ideological red flag to many conservatives, who regard them as a form of reverse discrimination. "I am against set-asides, period," says Pendleton. "The basic principles are offensive."

Pendleton was quickly rebuffed on virtually every side. The White House announced that Ronald Reagan continues to support set-asides. Congress, which has passed three such programs since 1977, seemed even less inclined to listen to the chairman's advice. Finally, the commission itself voted 5 to 3 to order a rewrite of the report on which Pendleton based his recommendation.

Pendleton, who was appointed by Reagan in 1982, vowed to continue trying to scuttle the program. He contends that set-asides add to federal procurement costs through reduced competition and reward firms that have not necessarily suffered from discrimination. Moreover, he says, they encourage the creation of dummy companies that are owned in name only by minorities or women.

Pendleton should know, his critics reply. In 1977, Pendleton and two white business partners set up an industrial supply firm in San Diego that unsuccessfully sought status as a minority vendor. "He is the last person in the world to talk about front companies," said Democratic Congressman Parren Mitchell of Baltimore, author of one federal set-aside program. Pendleton rejects the charge that the firm was a shell operation as "a lie."

The set-aside flap is only one aspect of Pendleton's career in San Diego that is coming under increasing scrutiny. Pendleton left the San Diego Urban League, which he headed from 1975 to 1982, with a deficit of $179,000, and the league sued him to recover part of $9,990 that he issued to himself on his final day of work to cover unused vacation time. The matter was settled confidentially out of court in 1983.

Pendleton's tenure as commission chairman has also raised a few eyebrows in Washington. The General Accounting Office disclosed to Congress that in the & past three years Pendleton has claimed $188,000 in salary payments for his part-time job, reporting a total of 706 workdays--twice the time claimed by any other current commissioner. If Pendleton does not run afoul of the commission for his views, he may still come to grief over his expenses.

With reporting by Anne Constable/Washington and Jon D. Hull/San Diego